


Common Ground

by thegraytigress



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Bromance, Bucky Barnes Feels, Friendship, Gen, Hurt Steve Rogers, Hurt/Comfort, Tony Stark Feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-27
Updated: 2014-10-27
Packaged: 2018-02-22 20:38:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,474
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2521013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegraytigress/pseuds/thegraytigress
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It took a lot for Tony to realize that Barnes wasn't broken beyond repair. But it takes even more for the two of them to discover that they have something in common. Unfortunately, that something - someone - is bleeding to death right in front of them, and in order to save him they have to find some faith in each other. Sequel to "In Repair".</p>
            </blockquote>





	Common Ground

**Author's Note:**

> **DISCLAIMER:** _Captain America: The Winter Soldier_ and _The Avengers_ are the properties of Walt Disney Studios, Paramount Studios, and Marvel Studios. This work was created purely for enjoyment. No money was made, and no infringement was intended.
> 
>  **RATING:** T (for language, violence)
> 
>  **AUTHOR'S NOTE:** Hello, my darlings! So this is a sequel to ["In Repair".](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2132712) A lot people asked for more Tony, Steve, and Bucky bromance, so here's some (plus whump and angst and all that). You probably don't need to read "In Repair" to follow this, but it would help.

When Tony came to, it wasn’t pleasant.  He’d woken up hung over more times than he cared to remember, so he was no stranger to having to squeeze his eyes shut against the pounding in his head or swallowing down the burning rise of bile in the back of his throat or choking out some sort of garbled, alien sound that vaguely resembled a groan.  This time he was doing all of the above, plus suffering through a miserably wicked case of vertigo, but even still it didn’t take much for him to remember that his present sad state wasn’t because he’d had one (or more) too many.

“Ugh.  Damn it.”  He closed his eyes again, trying to ride out the waves of equal parts pain and nausea assailing his body.  He’d only looked for a second, but that had been long enough to see enough faint outlines of lighter shades of black and gray and realize he wasn’t in his room at the Tower.  The smell of damp rock and the feel of chilly, unforgiving dirt below his back was enough to further convince him of that.  After a seeming eternity of his stomach trying to invert itself inside of him, he managed to get it together enough to look again.

Yeah, definitely not his penthouse.

“Shit,” he breathed.  At discovering the hulking mass of rock looming threateningly over him, he sagged down deeper onto the ground.  Memories were coming back quickly now, jabbing out of the fog like spears.  The Avengers had been called to stop some sort of minor alien invasion.  At least, it had started out minor.  When the alien ships that had landed in the middle of Manhattan suddenly morphed into giant sentient robots, things had rapidly gone from the proverbial “bad” state to the “worse” state and then to the “worst” state and then to the “shit has hit the fan” state.  They’d been outnumbered already by the invaders; though these small aliens hadn’t alone posed much of a threat, when they ganged up they were dangerous and quick to overwhelm.  But tack onto that the two huge Transformers (Tony couldn’t think of them any other way than that), and the odds had slipped from their favor rather depressingly and without much warning.  Thor and the Hulk were the only ones truly capable of dealing with the robots; Tony had unloaded half his arsenal of missiles and rockets on one and had hardly damaged it.  The attack had certainly pissed it off, though, and Tony had quickly found himself being chased through lower Manhattan with the thing on his tail.  The other Avengers had tried to get it off of him, Sam and Thor in the air laboring trying to distract and divert it, and the Hulk had chased it with all the speed and power his rage could provide him.  However, none of that had made a damn bit of difference.  He remembered shouting over the communications link, his voice tight because he was _panicking_ (not that he’d admit that), and the other Avengers shouting back, frantic to do something to help him.  Clint yelling desperately from his bird’s eye view of the fight and Natasha apologizing for not being able to help and Steve commanding that Tony _get out of there._

He’d never had the chance.  The robot had hit him with some sort of beam, a directed, powerful EMP it seemed, and it had shorted out Iron Man like nothing.  The suit had completely shut down, propulsion systems disengaging and the HUD winking out before his terrified eyes and his connection with the team and JARVIS disappearing in a flash of light and a whine that momentarily deafened him.  After that there’d been the horrible sensation of plummeting like a _rock_.  He hadn’t been that high, only a few hundred feet, but he’d been darting through the city at incredible speeds.  His momentum carried him, and with a halting breath he’d been careening into the ground at high velocity and with no way to stop himself.  He was going to die.  That had been the only thought in his mind as he’d fallen.  _I’m going to die._

He hadn’t.  _Someone_ had caught him.  He’d barely managed to overcome the horrific sensation of spinning weightlessly before he’d collided with something firm but decidedly not as deadly firm as the street or a building.  “I got you, Tony.”  _Steve._   Tony had scrambled, shaken beyond any rational thought, to pull the emergency release on his useless suit – his suit that had nearly become his coffin.  The places of his armor had fallen away with a hydraulic hiss, and he’d barely had the time to duck behind Captain America and his shield before the huge robot monster was upon them.  There had been the _crack crack_ of a rifle and a blur of black and silver – _Barnes_ – right in front of the robot’s monstrous feet.  Barnes had moved fast, knocking away a chunk of a car headed for Steve with his metal arm while Steve had demanded breathlessly if Tony was okay.  The two of them had stood side to side in front of Tony, protecting his now pathetically vulnerable body, while the towering robot had fired up some sort of arm cannon.  The last thing Tony recalled clearly was Steve screaming for them to run before the road had exploded beneath their feet.

Apparently he’d fallen and landed underground beneath some seriously intense rubble.  It was so dark that he could barely see six inches in front of his face.  Tony laid there a moment, trying to collect himself and take a quick inventory of his body.  He hurt, but not as badly as he thought he should have considering how close he’d come to dying.  Shifting his limbs revealed nothing was broken, and aside from a nasty knock on the side of his head which he discovered with probing fingertips, he was remarkably unharmed.

But Barnes and Steve had been there with him.  And they weren’t with him now. 

 _Not good._   Tony jolted forward in shock and terror.  Thankfully the rocky ceiling was high enough that he didn’t hit his head in his rush, but it was too close.  He groaned, bracing his forearm against whatever was above him.  It was so dark, and there wasn’t much room to move.  “Steve?” he called.  Tony’s rushed breaths were extremely loud in the silence that followed.  Tony glanced around frantically.  “Steve!  Cap!”  There was still nothing.  He scrambled to his feet and nearly pitched back to the ground when the pain and nausea both simultaneously kicked it up a notch in intensity.  He managed to recover himself, and as he stood there, panting and trying to see _something_ , it occurred to him that he had his cell phone.  Tony breathed a silent prayer that it survived the double falls and the not so pleasant landings as he fished for it in the back pocket of his jeans.  “Thank you, God,” he breathed when he discovered it was still intact and working.

He thumbed it on and lifted it quickly, blasting bright white light over his surroundings.  It was as bad as he feared.  He was trapped in what looked like an old subway tunnel; the long, metal rails glinted in the striking glow a few feet from his shoes.  A huge portion of the street on which they’d been standing had come down into this place.  The rocky ceiling a mere foot above his head wasn’t a ceiling or rock but the inverted asphalt surface of the road.  Wreckage was everywhere, chunks of the street and crushed pieces of cars and who knew what else forming a maze-like cage around him.  Tony’s rapid panting was deafening in the tightly enclosed area.  He wasn’t claustrophobic normally, but – _my God_ – this was terrifying.

Tony gasped, struggling to keep his heart from pounding out of his chest.  “Steve!  Barnes!”  Only the echo of his voice among the shadows and debris answered.  “Barnes!”

“Stark.”  The rough call nearly frightened him to death.  He whirled and saw Barnes emerging from the shadows to his left.  He was half crawling along the damp filth on the ground.  Tony staggered to him, grabbing his arm and hauling him up as tenderly as he could for both their sakes.

“You alright?” Tony asked, looking over the other man quickly.  Aside from a gash on Barnes’ jaw, he seemed okay.  And he probably wouldn’t tell Tony if he wasn’t.  More than a month had passed since the explosive argument between the two of them that had resulted in Steve ending up in the ICU and Barnes and Tony tentatively burying the hatchet.  Since then, the tension in the Tower had lessened.  Tony no longer felt so utterly overrun, disregarded, and pissed off about the situation, and Barnes had relaxed around him, coming out even further from under the once crushing mantle of the Winter Soldier.  Of course, all of this had been no small part thanks to Steve, who’d latched onto those early, tentative signs of toleration between the two men and sculpted and molded incessantly as he tried to turn that into friendship.  Steve was stubborn and too damn good sometimes, so he kept at it in his gentle, unassuming way, trying to draw both Tony and Barnes into every conversation he could, finding ways to smooth over the rough edges, striving to help them see eye to eye.  It would mean a lot to Steve if they did.  That much was obvious to both of them, and they were working on it.  Or trying to work on it.  Tony had fixed Barnes’ malfunctioning arm.  Barnes was making an effort to come out of his shell more, to be more affable and open, but it frankly wasn’t easy for either of them.  They didn’t like each other.  Every interaction between them was tense and forced.  They were both loaded with their own baggage, scarred and damaged and broken in varying ways and to varying extents.  And then, of course (how could he ever forget?) there was that little fact that Barnes had assassinated Tony’s parents under HYDRA’s control.  But they were trying to deal with each other in a friendly-ish manner for Steve’s sake.

Trying, but not succeeding if the emotionless look with which Barnes saddled him was any indication.  Tony always had such a difficult time reading him.  Honestly that was one of the (many) reasons he didn’t like him.  As fast as that scowl came, it was gone, and it was replaced by a very open expression of worry of which Tony wouldn’t have thought the ex-assassin capable.  “Where’s Steve?”

Barnes didn’t wait for Tony’s response (not that he had one, except to start panicking anew), tearing his arm away and scrambling in the dark.  The meager light from Tony’s phone jittered and danced as he moved about the wreckage wildly.  Barnes was a frantic shadow, darting among the piles of rubble.  Together the two of them did nothing but search, digging into the crevices, pushing the rocks and chunks of cement aside where they could.  Tony tried not to think, because even acknowledging the very real possibility that Steve was buried under all of this, that Steve could be _already dead_ , was far too distressing.  He’d had enough of seeing Steve hurt over the last few months.  There was that, too, that he hadn’t been able to get over.  Barnes – _the Winter Soldier_ – had shot Steve four times and left him to bleed to death on the riverbank of the Potomac when SHIELD had fallen almost a year ago.  Maybe Steve had forgiven Barnes for that; after all, the man had been brainwashed and twisted by HYDRA almost beyond repair.  Tony was trying to, again for Steve’s sake, but it wasn’t easy.  Nothing ever was.

His mind so was lost in those rushed thoughts and panic that he almost didn’t register Barnes’ cry.  “Over here!”  Tony whirled, the light smearing through the blackness almost nauseatingly, and saw the other man struggling to lift what looked like part of the tunnel’s ceiling if the metal supports were any indication.  Tony scrambled closer, setting his phone to the ground to keep the light steady before standing beside Barnes.  There probably wasn’t much he could do; Barnes’ bionic arm was significantly stronger than him, maybe even stronger than Steve.  But he couldn’t just watch, so he threw whatever power he had into trying to move the humongous and ridiculously heavy rubble out of the way.  Damn that freaking robot Transformer thing for frying his suit.  He really needed it now.

A few stiff seconds of pushing and lifting did the trick at least, and Barnes was able to move the crumbling cement away.  Tony gasped for breath, wondering what it was that had led Barnes to this spot.  He saw in short order.  “Oh, shit,” he whispered, dropping to his hands and knees.

The light barely reached Steve’s body, but what it touched showed a hideous picture of dirt and blood.  His shield was still on his right arm, and it was laying over his chest and part of his neck.  That was fortunate because it had probably taken most of the weight of that piece of the ceiling that had fallen on him and saved his life.  _For now, anyway._   The bitter thought lanceted through Tony’s shock as he looked over the blood dripping from Steve’s right leg.  It was clearly broken, and the break was very bad; he could tell that even without the scanners of his suit.  He was hemorrhaging.  Another long piece of cement was lying across Steve’s abdomen, and Barnes’ metallic fingers curled around it and tossed it away like it weighed nothing.  The man fell to his knees at Steve’s side.  “Is he…”  Tony couldn’t say it.

Barnes jabbed his flesh and blood fingers to the pulse point under Steve’s jaw.  Tony stared at his friend’s filthy face, unable to think or move or even breathe as he waited for Barnes to announce something.  Steve was so pale under the grime.  He looked…  “He’s alive,” Barnes breathed.  There was relief in his voice that was deep and heart-rending, and he closed his eyes and slumped just for a moment.  Just for a moment.  Tony did, too.  Christ, he’d been scared.

Barnes recovered faster than he did.  “Bring the light over.”  Tony was still reeling too hard to do anything other than obey, reaching for his phone and lifting it to shed stark illumination on the horrid scene.  Barnes was unsnapping the clasps of Steve’s helmet.  He carefully worked it loose from Steve’s head.  Then he muttered something that sounded vulgar in Russian. 

“Shit,” Tony whispered again.  There was blood under Steve’s neck.  It was flowing from a wound on the base of his skull.  He’d probably been struck during the fall.  The gushing welt was dangerously close to his brain stem.  Tony knew more than most people about, well, _everything,_ so he knew that this was bad.  This was very bad.  “Don’t move him!”

“I know,” Barnes hastily responded.  “Steve, can you hear me?”  He worked Steve’s fingers loose of their grip on the straps of his shield and pulled the dusty, bloody thing free of his arm.  Then he grabbed Steve’s hand.  “Open your eyes.”

Tony watched, his heart hoping but his mind knowing better.  A blow to that area of the head with that amount of force was deadly.  But patience (and accepting inevitability) had never been a strong suit of his, so he scooted closer, his jeans scraping over the dirty floor of the tunnel.  Maybe Steve would listen to him.  “Steve, it’s Tony.  Come on.  Listen to me.  Can you open your eyes?”

Nothing.  Steve’s eyelashes were pressed tightly to his skin.  He was barely breathing, each movement of his chest a weak rattle of air between his bruised lips.  He probably had internal injuries on top of everything else, if the wet sound of his wheezing was any indication.  It made sense, considering half a city street had buried them.  Tony felt so angry and frightened and goddamn _useless_ right then that choking down a sob was all he could do to stay in control.  What the hell?  Did fate have it out for Steve Rogers?  _Twice._   Twice in a month all the shitty luck in the world had struck the one person Tony knew who was so unequivocally good, pure, and noble that he deserved only the best.  Tony and Barnes were okay.  Trapped, but okay.  Alone, but okay.  Banged up, but _okay_.  Steve had been crushed.  A twist of fate or destiny or whatever.  Wrong place, wrong time.   _Again_.  “This is bullshit,” he muttered around angry tears.

Barnes gave up on trying to prod Steve to awareness.  It wasn’t working.  If it had been any other man hurt like this, he would have been dead.  But it was Steve, and the super soldier serum had saved his life.  Barely.  And for the moment.  They needed to get him help _right now_ or all the enhanced healing factor in the world wouldn’t matter.

Barnes was coming to the same realization.  He, too, was white beneath the filth, blood, and bruises on his face.  His shoulder-length brown hair was laden with dust and dirt, and he looked crushed, metaphorically at any rate.  Devastated.  More and more of Barnes as he had been (at least, as Tony thought he had been – he really had no basis of comparison) was seeping out of the cold exterior of the Winter Soldier every day.  Right now he looked lost in a way Tony had only seen once before: when he’d sat at Steve’s bedside in the hospital after the accident in the Tower all those weeks ago.  This was worse since back then they’d known Steve would be okay.  “What do we do?” Barnes asked.

 _I don’t know!_   Tony wanted to snap at him.  He wanted to get _angry_ and take it out on Barnes because this hurt so much, but he didn’t.  That wouldn’t solve anything.  Steve had taught him something about keeping his impulsivity under control.  Something told him, back in the day, he might have taught Barnes the same.  Barnes was still so empty and cold to him, but every so often he caught a glimpse of who he had been before he’d been turned by HYDRA into the world’s deadliest assassin.  Like now.  And he didn’t know what Barnes wanted from him.  The truth?  A way out?  _A way to save Steve._   He didn’t have one.  And when he actually said what he was thinking, he didn’t sound angry or spiteful or anything but pathetic.  “I don’t know.”

The solemn declaration was booming in the silence.  Whatever color that might have been in Barnes’ cheeks completely drained at that point, and Tony realized that the other man really had been looking to him for an answer.  For a way to fix this.  That was even more devastating.  Tony floundered a second more.  “Let’s… uh…  If we can’t move him, we have to get the others to us.”

“We have to get this to stop bleeding first,” Barnes responded.  It looked like his shock was dissipating.  “It’s real bad.”  He was talking about Steve’s leg, which was letting loose a veritable river of blood.  “Give me your shirt.”

Tony nodded numbly, his fingers fumbling at the buttons of his Oxford.  Barnes was up, pawning through the wreckage around him until he found a slightly twisted iron rebar.  He came back with that and took Tony’s outstretched shirt.  He had a knife that he’d drawn from somewhere in his own combat uniform and he made short work of cutting Tony’s shirt up into bandage-like strips.  Then he handed the knife to Tony.  “See if you can get his uniform off.”

“That’s not going to cut it,” Tony said, shivering a little in the damp, cold air.  “Literally.  It’s enhanced carbon polymer mesh.  I designed it to withstand your average slicing and dicing.”

Barnes scowled at that.  “Then at least get it loose from his neck.”

Tony nodded, reaching for the zipper on the side of the suit.  They worked silently for a moment to stabilize Steve, Tony fumbling to loosen the uniform top from Steve’s throat and chest while Barnes dealt with his leg.  For once he wished he still had the arc reactor; at least with that maintaining a steady light source would have been easier than trying to juggle holding his cell phone up for Barnes as he unzipped Steve’s uniform.  Barnes tied the strips of his shirt together and wrapped them carefully around Steve’s upper thigh above the break.  Swallowing down the sour taste in the back of his throat, Tony made himself watch as Barnes looped the makeshift tourniquet around the rebar and then started to twist the bar like a corkscrew, turning the cloth tighter and tighter until it was a thick, wound coil around both the iron and Steve’s leg.  “You know what you’re doing?”

Barnes glared at him.  “Yes.”

“Okay.”

Steve didn’t react one bit to the pain.  “The artery’s compromised,” Barnes declared softly.

Tony didn’t mean to sound like an ass, but damn if that wasn’t pretty freaking obvious.  “You think?”

Barnes’ glower turned positively violent.  “He’s crushed inside.  He’ll bleed out, even with this.”

Tony had feared that, suspected it if he was honest with himself, but hearing Barnes say it made it too real and too painful.  “How long?”

Barnes’ Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed.  The hardened machine was gone in a blink, and the man terrified of losing his best friend was back.  He grabbed Steve’s hand were it lay across his belly and held it tightly.  “Not long.”

Tony swallowed through a dry throat.  He stared at Steve’s white face.  He didn’t know what to say, what to do.  What to think.  Barnes’ voice cut through the heavy, anguished silence.  “That work down here?” he asked with a tip of his head to the phone still clenched in Tony’s hand.

Of course it wouldn’t, not buried under who knew how many tons and feet of concrete, asphalt, and earth.  Stark Industries boasted the strongest mobile network on the planet, but it wasn’t that strong.  Still, he checked the screen because he was desperate, and his heart still stupidly sank when he saw the “NO SERVICE” warning appear in the system tray at the top of his phone.  He shook his head at Barnes.  And without his suit, he didn’t have JARVIS.  _Damn it all to hell._   “What about your comm?  Down?”

Barnes nodded, but he still tried it.  “This is Barnes.  Stark, Rogers, and I are trapped in a subway tunnel.  Does anyone copy?”  There was no answer.  Barnes waited a moment before trying again, his tone twisted with just a bit more desperation.  “Cap’s hurt.  He’s hurt badly.  We need immediate assistance.  Does anyone copy?”  Silence.  “Widow.  Hawkeye.  Thor.  Somebody answer!”

Nothing.  Barnes swore under his breath, and Tony could have kicked something.  _Of course._   Because when things went to shit, they _really_ went to shit.  “Well, one of us needs to try to find a way out of here to get help,” Tony supplied.  His voice was so shaky that he heard it crack with every word.  He hoped Barnes didn’t, both because he didn’t want to seem uncertain about Steve’s chances of survival and because he (as petty and childish as it was, and it _was_ beyond any debate) didn’t want to seem weak in front of the other man.  He was going to be the capable one, the one that didn’t lose it in a tough situation.  He tipped his head towards Barnes’.  “You go.”

In the harsh light of his phone, Barnes looked like some sort of serial killer (well, he had been a serial killer, but that was beside the point).  His glare could have cut steel, and if it hadn’t been for the fact that Tony saw him grasp Steve’s hand just a little tighter and more possessively, it all would have been fairly disturbing.  Tony heaved a sigh that quivered far too much for his liking.  “If there’s stuff that needs moving, I’m not going to be able to do it.  I’m freaking useless without my suit.”

Barnes didn’t say anything.  He didn’t argue or debate or comfort him with a placating nonsense.  Steve would have.  But Barnes didn’t.  Tony kind of wanted him to.  Still, Barnes just knelt there, looking hard and unhappy, scowling as he stared at Steve’s lax face.  “Alright,” he said after a few long moments filled with nothing but Tony’s heavy breathing, his thundering heart, and the creak and moan of the wreckage cocooning them.  “I need that.”

That was the phone, and Tony could have smacked himself for not thinking ahead.  Of course Barnes would need the phone.  How in the world was he going to find a way out if he couldn’t see anything?  “Right,” Tony said unhappily.  He glanced at his phone again.  He had 52% battery.  He cursed inwardly at that and wished he’d remembered to charge it the night before.  With the screen on all the time, the battery would drain fast.  StarkPhones had batteries that pretty much far surpassed any other smart phone on the market, but even still, they only had a few hours at best before it died on them.  He supposed there was no sense in telling Barnes that.  They’d be out of here and Steve would be in a hospital long before then.  Right?  And it definitely didn’t make any sense, but some part of him didn’t want to give the phone up.  It was dumb (and childish, _again_ ), but this was the only tech he had at this point.  He already felt exposed and pathetic enough without his suit.

Barnes was waiting.  He looked displeased (well, he always looked displeased but Tony couldn’t tell if it was because he was worried or frightened or just impatient.  Probably all of the above).  Tony sighed softly and handed him the phone.  “Don’t lose it or break it.  And don’t forget where we parked,” he quipped meagerly as Barnes pushed himself to his feet and walked off without another word or look, stalking into the shadows with the light from the phone illuminating his path.  Tony scooted even closer to Steve as the darkness closed about them, fighting the shiver trying to work its way up his back.  A dozen or so feet away, the section of road that had collapsed on them sloped even closer to the ground, so much so that Barnes had to drop to a crawl and slither on his stomach to get under the rubble.  That was even more disconcerting.  Even if they could move Steve, there was no way to get him out of here as hurt as he was.  That meant what Tony had been silently fearing was probably true.  They were going to have to wait for help to dig them out.

He probably should have told Barnes to be careful, but he suddenly couldn’t find his voice as the light disappeared completely.  The pitch was overwhelming, sucking the air from his lungs, colder and blacker than a moonless, starless night.  It was so chilly and musty, and he was just in his undershirt now.  A mounting sense of panic and dread coiled tightly in his belly, constricting and squeezing until it was hard to breathe.  He wanted to call out again, but he didn’t – _wouldn’t_ – because he could handle this and he’d be damned if he let Barnes think otherwise.  So instead he fumbled for Steve’s hand in the darkness.  His eyes were adjusting, and he could see a little, at least enough to find Steve’s grimy fingers and squeeze tight.  “Don’t worry, Cap,” he implored in a hushed voice.  “We got this.”

* * *

As it turned out, they didn’t have it.  Not by a long shot.

Tony sat there in complete silence for what seemed to be forever.  It was just him and Steve, and Steve hadn’t so much as twitched, let alone regained consciousness.  Tony stayed as close to Steve as he could, keeping a hand on his forehead and his other tightly wrapped around Steve’s own.  He was afraid to let him go for quite a few reasons, not the least of which being he was scared.  He also didn’t want Steve to wake up (because he was going to wake up) and be scared, too, not knowing where he was and who was around him in the darkness.  Tony had this silly and irrational fear lodged in the bottom of his heart that his grasp on Steve’s hand and his palm on Steve’s brow were anchoring him in this world, so if he let go, Steve would be lost and gone from him.  It was really crazy and stupid and very much not like him, but he couldn’t shake it.  It was amazing how rapidly rational thought fell away when one of the best friends you had was dying in front of your very eyes and there wasn’t a damn thing you could do to stop it.

Over Steve’s wheezing struggle for air and his own pounding heart, Tony could hear Barnes, but just barely.  It was an occasional shuffle here or an echoing thud there, but nothing really beyond that.  For a man who was supposed to be digging a path out of here, he sure was quiet.  Patience had never been a virtue of Tony’s, either, but he wasn’t about to leave Steve alone to figure out what was happening.  And he wasn’t going to call out to Barnes like some insecure damsel in distress.  So he just sat there, waiting.  He tried to look at his watch, but the light was so poor it really strained his eyes.  Had it been ten minutes?  Fifteen?  He didn’t know.  In this shadowy, confined hell, nothing was clear.

He started chatting.  The silence was too much, too hard.  He didn’t do well with silence.  “When we get out of this, you’re finished with this avenging crap,” Tony muttered, looking down on Steve’s gray and lifeless face.  He squeezed Steve’s hand, praying for some sort of response, even the _tiniest_ squeeze back, but there was nothing.  “You attract disaster even more than I do.  Seriously.  You are a walking, talking trouble magnet.  I’m relieving you of duty.  I’m like your second in command, so I can do that.  Done.  Finished.  You stay in the tower and run things from afar, because I can’t keep doing this.  God, Steve, I can’t do this again…”  His voice failed him, breaking and softening with grief and worry, and he ducked his head and wiped angrily at the wetness leaking from his eyes.  He dropped his voice to a whisper.  “And you left me here.  With him.  I know you think we’d get along if we tried, but you think that about everyone.  It’s bullshit, Cap.  I call it as I see it.  You know that.  He doesn’t like me, plain as day, and, well, let’s face it.  The feeling is kind of mutual.”

Steve did nothing.  Said nothing.  Tony wasn’t going to break down.  Nope, not happening.  “Damn it, Steve, please…  Wake up.  Wake up.  I need you.  We need you.”  No amount of begging or pleading was making a difference.  “You can’t do this to me.  I can’t do this.  I can’t–”

The mass of crushed asphalt and twisted rebars and crumbling cement that was the ceiling dropped down a good inch, and Tony nearly jumped out of his skin.  He threw himself over Steve’s body without thinking as a deluge of dust and debris tumbled down on them.  _Oh, God!  Christ!_   He squeezed his eyes shut, tucking Steve’s head under his neck and chest as everything shook and rumbled around him.  Eventually it stopped, and he chanced opening his eyes again.  The prison of rock and rubble around them hadn’t changed much, but obviously it wasn’t stable.  “Barnes!” he screamed.  He raised himself to look down on Steve, worrying for a minute he’d been dumb and careless enough to smother him.  But Steve was still breathing ( _thank God_ ).  _“Barnes!”_

He heard the thundering of boots and the scraping of rocks.  Tony held his breath, praying with all of his might that the rubble _stay put_ as he pressed his fingers to Steve’s pulse point again.  Steve’s heartbeat was thready and racing.  He was probably in shock, given the amount of blood pooling around his shattered leg and behind his head.  The ceiling rumbled again – _like a goddamn earthquake!  Was it too much to hope that this would be stable?_   “Barnes, goddamn it!”

Barnes reappeared finally, scrambling closer, the light heralding his approach.  Tony looked up, frantic, icy panic leaving him shivering.  “We have to move him!  This whole place is coming down!”

Barnes’ jaw clenched.  Maybe he hadn’t seen or heard the rubble shifting; how he couldn’t have, Tony had no idea.  And there was no time to argue.  “His neck is–”

“It’s better than dead, don’t you think?” Tony snapped.  He was already moving, struggling to lift Steve’s legs.  There wasn’t much room to maneuver and he knew from past experience that Steve weighed a ton, so he was basically wasting energy but he wasn’t going to sit there and do nothing while the tunnel came down on top of them.

Barnes practically batted him out of the way like he was nothing.  “Hold his head steady!” he barked, and Tony had no choice but to comply.  He scrambled around to the other side, getting his hands under Steve’s head.  “On three.  One.  Two.  Three!”  They lifted together, Tony trying fervently to match Barnes’ every move so as to keep Steve’s neck from moving.  He grimaced both at his impatience and the warm wetness coating his fingers under the back of Steve’s head.  They shuffled to the left, ducking to escape the lowered ceiling of rubble.  Barnes had his metal arm under Steve’s shoulder and his other under Steve’s knees.  Tony knew Barnes was enhanced somehow, by some version of the super soldier serum.  Bruce had wanted to test it, but the man had adamantly refused.  Right then he was managing Steve’s weight, but it wasn’t easy.  Tony didn’t know if it was from unseen injuries or the emotional strain, but whatever it was, he silently cursed and urged him to move faster.  The light from his phone was shaking all over from where it was half stuffed in his jeans, so it was difficult to see where they were stepping and falling would likely result in disaster.

Finally, _finally_ , they escaped to a slightly clearer area.  “Down?” Tony gasped.

“Yes.”  Together they lowered Steve’s limp body to the filthy floor.  They situated his upper body first.  Tony quickly fished his phone out of his pocket, making a pointed effort to ignore the red all over his hands, and he held it so Barnes could look at Steve’s leg.  “Get his shield.”

Tony wanted to argue, but the rubble groaning again effectively muted his desire to be a pain in the ass.  He rushed over to where Steve’s shield lay among the debris, crouching to scoop it up before returning to Barnes’ side.  Steve looked positively awful.  There was no color in his skin, his face waxy and ashen and covered in a cold sweat.  He looked about one tiny step from death’s door.  “Well,” Tony said.   His voice was miserably gruff now that he’d found it.  “At least we’re over here now.  It’s a little roomier.  The décor is about as shitty, though.”

“Is everything a joke to you?” Barnes snapped coldly.  He tightened the tourniquet with a jerk.

“No,” Tony responded sharply, trying his hardest not to remember the fact that Steve had said the same thing him four years ago when they’d met.  “This isn’t funny.  He’s going to die down here and we can’t do anything to stop it!”

At that, the rubble where they had been came down with a loud snap and a booming crash that shook the tunnel.  Barnes was the one to throw himself over Steve this time, and Tony jerked but didn’t do much more than crumple to the ground and cover his head.  The deafening cacophony roared on for what felt to be a long time, and when it was over, where they had been was buried under tons and tons of rubble.

Tony struggled to breathe through the thick and oppressive dust in the air.  He coughed, wiping at this eyes as he shined the light over at the now impenetrable wall of rubble.  “I guess we’re not going that way,” he said, trying as hard as he could to mask his fear.  He was hanging on by a thread here.  He turned and regarded Barnes, who was slow to release Steve and trust they were safe.  “Please tell me you found something down the other way.”

Barnes shook his head solemnly.  If he was at all bothered by his failure, it wasn’t obvious.  “It’s blocked,” he lowly responded.  “I tried moving some of the debris.”  He didn’t say anything more, but he didn’t need to.  He’d attempted to move the rubble, and that had destabilized it.  _Shit._   It was a goddamn house of cards.  With his suit, with JARVIS analyzing the data and detecting weaknesses and predicting outcomes, there was a chance he could have figured out which pieces could be removed and which pieces were vital in supporting the weakened ceiling of the tunnel.  Without it, he was blind.  And they couldn’t risk unsettling anything more.

Barnes had come to at least that final conclusion.  He looked dismayed, small, and lost.  He laid his hand on Steve’s forehead, tenderly stroking back the mussed blond hair.  “He’s not going to die,” he swore softly.  “I won’t let him die.”

“Right,” Tony snapped.  That sat wrong with him.  It really did.  Suddenly all of the vitriol that had been there before he and Barnes had made their small scrap of peace was back.  This man in front of him wasn’t Steve’s friend.  He wasn’t an Avenger.  He was a murdering, lying son of a bitch who didn’t deserve to lick the ground that Steve walked on.  Or that any of them walked on.  “And just how the hell are you planning on stopping it?  Huh?”

Barnes flashed furious eyes at him.  “I don’t know.”

“You don’t know,” Tony snidely repeated.

“Find a way to reach the team,” Barnes ordered.  He was watching Tony with icy, expectant eyes.  “Steve said you can fix anything, make anything work.  So fix my comm.  Make that phone work.”

Tony couldn’t hold in his rage.  “Well, since you don’t know how to fix a goddamn thing, let me tell you that there’s no way I can make this phone–”  He jabbed the device toward Barnes.  He could have sworn the other man actually flinched.  “–get a signal through however many tons of rock there is between us and the rest of the Avengers.  Oh, and that’s if _they’re_ still alive.  We kinda bailed on them in the middle of a freaking battle, in case you missed it.”

Barnes looked dismayed.  “There has to be something,” he insisted.

“There isn’t!” Tony roared.  His voice cracked again.  His heart was aching so heavily in his chest.  “I know you know that!”

“You know what I know?” Barnes snapped back.  “Steve doesn’t quit.  He doesn’t give up.  He’s lived through horrible stuff before.”

“Funny, coming from you.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“I think you know.”

“Who do you think you are?”  Barnes’ eyes flashed murderously, just enough to take Tony back to that moment in the Tower where they’d come to blows a few months ago.  Apparently he hadn’t learned his lesson then that provoking a live wire like Barnes was like fiddling with something that was armed and dangerous and primed to blow up in his face.  “Who are you to judge me?”

“Steve’s friend,” Tony returned sternly, “which is a hell of a lot more than you’ve been to him since you came back into his life.”

If he’d been walking a fine line before, he’d just crossed it.  And not like pushing his big toe over it just to see what would happen.  He was full-blown _charging_ over it and saying to hell with the consequences.  Barnes was going to kill him.  And Steve was a fool to think they could ever be friends.  “His friend?  You don’t know me, and you don’t know him.  You don’t know a damn thing about us.”

“I know he killed himself to save you.  Not even just once.”

“You think I haven’t done the same for him?  That I wouldn’t?  You weren’t there, Stark.  You weren’t there every time I pulled him out of a fight or saved his ass from the bullies on our street or picked him up and carried him and took care of him when he was sick!  You haven’t watched him cough his lungs out or burn up with a fever that won’t quit!”

That tempered Tony’s anger a little, but not enough.  Christ, this was petty.  And this wasn’t the time.  But he couldn’t stop himself.  “Who do _you_ think picked him up when he woke up here with no friends and no family and nothing?  Huh?  Who do you think gave him a home and helped him figure out his place here?  The Avengers did.  _I_ did.”

Barnes looked like he was one moment away from attacking him.  “You arrogant bastard,” Barnes sneered.  “Is this some sort of contest?”

“I don’t know.  You tell me.”

“No, _you_ tell me.  What gives you the right to judge me?”

“You did, when you murdered my parents and shot Captain America four times while he was trying to stop your HYDRA buddies from destroying the world!” 

Barnes averted his eyes, like throwing his crimes in his face was unbearable to him.  It certainly was a low blow. “I apologized to him.  He accepted it.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“I don’t care.  And I apologized to you.”

Barnes had.  Once.  And not in a way that made it clear for what he was making amends.  Tony swallowed a lump in his throat.  “Maybe that’s not enough.”

“What else do you want from me?” Barnes demanded.  “What?”

Tony couldn’t make himself spit out the rest of the words on the tip of his tongue.  A few weeks ago he would have thrown it all out there, no holds barred, because he honestly believed Steve getting hurt so badly during the battle with HYDRA over the Potomac was Barnes’ fault.  He honestly believed everything was Barnes’ fault.  The defeated expression on Steve’s face.  The burdens on Steve’s shoulders.  Losing Steve as he had been before he’d found out Barnes was still alive.  Some part of Tony still blamed Barnes for all of that, for coming into their lives and disrupting their team and the bonds among them.  But that part was tempered now with reason and understanding.  Compassion.  And there was no answer as to what else could be done to ameliorate the past, and they both knew it.  No answer as why things had happened as they had.  No way to make amends.  No nothing.  So he swallowed down the poisonous things he still wanted to say and dropped his head to his chest with a tired sigh.  “Let’s just not do this.  Let’s not rip at each other.  Being stuck down here with each other and with Steve like this is bad enough as it is.”

Barnes nodded, like he, too, was trying to hold back another unpleasant and completely counterproductive reaction.  Fighting would get them nowhere, and they needed to get out.  “I _know_ him,” he finally said when the silence became too pressing.  “He’s not going to give up, so we can’t either.  He’ll come through it.  I’ve got faith in that.  I’ve seen it before.”

“You have?  Really?  Or are you just telling yourself that?  Or did Steve tell you that and you’re making yourself believe it?”  Tony wasn’t trying to be hurtful now, but it was all the same, and he knew it.  It hurt him, too.  He knew Barnes’ memories of his life before he’d fallen from the HYDRA train in 1945 were still sketchy.  They were better, no doubt about it, more solid and reliable, but still Tony couldn’t be sure how much of his past he was actually remembering versus what his brain was trying to fill in from what Steve told him.  And Steve was so damn optimistic all the time, so naïve and loyal to a fault.  He saw the best in everything and everyone.  He was Captain America.

And Tony was Tony.  He liked arguing and being difficult.  When he was stressed and upset, that was his default response.  Arguing and being difficult.  He was good at playing devil’s advocate.  He liked picking things apart, exposing their weaknesses so he could understand them and fix them.  He didn’t bother with sentimental bullshit and unfounded hope in the face of scientific and mathematical certainty.  He believed in Steve, of course.  They’d been friends for a while now, and it was hard not to have faith in Captain America when he inspired it and warranted it as well as he did.  But Tony was too smart to blindly believe something when the inevitable and undeniable facts were staring him in the face.  God, he hated himself for being this way sometimes, but being so smart was a curse as much as it was a blessing.  “You were right before.  He’s going to bleed out.  Even if his leg’s under control, we can’t do anything about whatever’s bleeding inside him.”

“Go,” Barnes implored, ignoring Tony completely.  “Go look around.  Maybe you’ll see something I didn’t.”

The pessimist inside Tony reared his ugly head again.  He’d been betrayed by hope too many times in the past to blindly give himself over to it now.  And the fact that Barnes wanted to believe in dumb stuff like destiny and everything working out in the end was really pissing him off.  “Didn’t you hear what I said?  He’s bleeding out!  Hypovolemic shock!  He’s going to die!”

Barnes wasn’t standing for his bullshit.  “Go,” he said again, lowly and threateningly.  “Go, Stark.  Right now.”

“My smarts and your faith isn’t going to be enough,” Tony tightly retorted.  “We need the Hulk to dig us out of here.  You got a distress beacon stuffed up that suit of yours some place?”

“Goddamn it, Stark!” Barnes raged.  “Shut up and go.  You’re wasting time.  _Go!_ ”

Tony was stunned into silence.  It wasn’t so much the sharp words or his raised tone; Barnes had certainly said cruel things to him in the past (not wholly undeservedly), and he’d even shouted once or twice.  It was the way he said it, raw and desperate with his eyes shining with unshed tears.  Like he was trying to hang onto that faith they’d talked about, trying frantically and he’d outright fail if Tony didn’t act.  If Tony didn’t help.  That was enough to make him move, to make him go, even though he was afraid of the shadowy mess beyond their small sanctum of light.  And even if he was afraid to leave Steve, afraid that Steve would die while he was gone.

But he stood and shuffled away wordlessly, angrily praying that there was a way out of this and that _he_ would be the one to find it.

* * *

He didn’t.  He didn’t find a thing.  He didn’t figure anything out.  What felt like hours went by, but in reality it was only maybe thirty minutes.  Thirty minutes he spent searching around in the pitch darkness around them, trying not to panic, trying not to feel every second slip away from his fingers as he grasped dirt and debris and dug uselessly in them.  Barnes had been completely truthful.  There was nothing.  Once he slid through that tiny gap between the rubble and the floor, he was able to walk down the tunnel maybe a good twenty feet before it became completely obstructed.  The wall of debris was part of the ceiling and maybe more of the road, and it went from the ground all the way up nearly a dozen feet.  He tilted his phone to the top, looking for even the slightest hint of a crack between the pile and the ceiling or a weakness in wall, but there was nothing, at least nothing he could reach.  And he tested the rubble blocking their way, searching for parts that could be moved without disrupting everything above, but again he found nothing.  _There has to be something._   There wasn’t.  _There has to be something!_

There wasn’t.

He plodded on weary feet, his shoulders slumped and his stature the very definition of defeated, back to Steve and Barnes.  He found them exactly as he’d left them.  Barnes was close to Steve, as close as he could be without having the other man in his arms.  He looked pained at even that small distance between them, that he _couldn’t_ hold Steve like he clearly wanted to with the blow Steve had taken to his head and neck.  Instead he had both of Steve’s hands in between his own, fingers curled together, metal and flesh.  Barnes’ shoulders were shaking.  Tony stopped a few feet behind them, though with him bearing the only light in this place, Barnes surely noticed him coming even though he couldn’t see him.  That didn’t stop Barnes from doing whatever he was doing – whispering?  Murmuring?  _Singing?_   Tony was not sure which first, but he decided after a beat that it was definitely that.  He was singing, and Tony could hardly fathom it.

Eventually, after what felt to be a very long time, he managed to come closer.  He cleared his throat mostly because he was nervous and uncomfortable, not because he wasn’t sure Barnes knew he was there.  “You were right,” he said hoarsely.  “It’s blocked.”

Barnes didn’t respond right away, but the low timbre of his voice grew silent.  For all his dislike of the other man, Tony felt like he had no right to come closer.  It was a thing with him, with all of them in a way.  Barnes was Steve’s friend first, but Tony was his friend now.  Barnes was right; it was like some sort of stupid contest, childish for certain but difficult to put aside.  Barnes was a stranger to himself and therefore in some ways a stranger to Steve, though Steve would never admit that.  That made this great friendship – _brotherhood_ – they had shared in their youths and during the war strained and uncertain.  Tony had only known Steve for a handful of years, and some of those years they’d spent at odds (that was putting it mildly), but in some respects their brief bond was _more_ than whatever Barnes had with him now because it was comfortable and well-defined and forged out of respect.  This whole situation was screwed up and confusing and one of the reasons Tony still had such a hard time finding his footing with Barnes.  This thing between the two of them, with Steve in the middle…  It was incalculable and amorphous and undefinable.  Whenever Steve and Bucky waxed nostalgic about the good old days in Brooklyn and the war, Tony felt like a third wheel and shut down.  He was pretty sure Barnes felt the same and did the same whenever Tony and Steve chatted about the Avengers, about leading the team and running the missions.  Like if one of them was together with Steve, the other had no place.  This led to the inevitable (though thankfully silent) nonsense about egos and pride and who _deserved_ Steve.  Who was the better man.  The better, _closer_ friend.  If there could be room for them both or if one had to sacrifice.  And if one did, _which_ one.

At this moment, with Barnes _praying_ over Steve’s dying husk of a body, Tony knew it had to be him.

“Steve’s ma used to sing this to him,” Barnes quietly admitted when the silence became unbearably uncomfortable, “when he was sick.  Something in Gaelic.  I can’t remember all the words right.”

This was a real memory.  Tony knew it in an instant.  It wasn’t something Barnes thought he knew or something of which he wished he could be sure.  This was real, certain, like the way Barnes handled his weapons or the way he fought or the way he followed orders.  It was the most of Barnes Tony had ever seen, when he really thought about it.  Sure, there were times when the Winter Soldier was far gone, when Barnes laughed with Clint and sparred with Natasha and loudly yelled over a football game with Sam or spoke seriously with Thor about the war.  There were times when Tony finally saw this man that the others had seen months ago.  But they were still rare, and Tony hadn’t ever let himself be a part of them.  He and Barnes had nothing between them, nothing that tied them together.  No common ground. 

And right now he was part of something so intimate, so raw and terrifying, that he couldn’t imagine interfering.  But he did.  He dropped to his knees wearily at Steve’s side, trying his damnedest to not feel anything.  He placed his filthy fingers, the tips cut and scraped raw from digging in the debris, against Steve’s carotid artery.  He sagged even more when he felt that weak flutter.  “Goddamn it,” he whispered.

There was a horrific bang, one loud enough to shake the cage of blackness around them, and Tony jerked in sudden and icy fright.  But it wasn’t more of the tunnel coming down on them.  It was Barnes’ metal arm, punching into the ground.  He was on his feet then, pacing the small, enclosed space, pacing like some sort of animal.  Like he was crawling with energy he couldn’t contain, couldn’t control.  His arm rammed into another hulking mass of debris, shaking it and thus rattling the entirety of the precarious structure around them.  Tony was on his feet before he thought better of it.  “Whoa.  Whoa!  Stop it!  You wanna bring this whole place down on us?  _Stop!”_

Barnes didn’t stop.  It was terrifying to see him like this.  He knew Barnes had, or had had at any rate, episodes like this, particularly when Steve and Sam had first brought him to Stark Tower some months back.  This was when the insanity of everything HYDRA had done to him eroded his control to the point where it wasn’t just the Winter Soldier who broke through.  It was _madness_ , unadulterated and all-consuming, the scars and the damage screaming.  Tony had never seen it before.  This was one of the things he’d hated the most when Steve had been struggling to bring Barnes back.  _These_ moments had manifested themselves in the bruises on Steve’s face and arms and chest and the dark bags under his eyes and the hollowed out expression he’d worn for days at a time.  Tony didn’t know how to face this.  The only person who was apparently capable of reaching Barnes when he was like this was dying at their feet.

Tony would have to make do.  He tried not to be terrified, even as Barnes bashed the rubble again and then collapsed against it in spent and frustrated fury.  He stepped closer and tentatively reached a shaking hand to the other man’s shoulder.  He expected to be hit or thrown back or _worse_ , but he wasn’t.  And when Barnes didn’t strike him or shove him, he was emboldened enough to come closer.  Despite everything, all the hatred he’d once felt for this man and all the unresolved issues between them, he rubbed Barnes’ shoulder in comfort and commiseration.  “Hey, hey,” he said softly, nonthreateningly.  “You know what?  You’re right.  You’ve known Steve longer than me.  Way longer.  But I know he’s lived through some terrible shit before.  I’ve seen it.  You’ve seen it.  He’ll come through this.”

“You don’t know that,” Barnes responded lowly.  Roughly.  He eyed Tony like he didn’t recognize him.  Truth be told, Tony was wondering himself.  What the hell was he doing?  He didn’t do comfort for people he _liked_.  He sucked at offering up solace or a shoulder to cry on.

But all he could think about was Barnes’ calm faith before and all he could see was the shattered look in his eyes now.  That made him keep going.  “No, I don’t know that.  But you know what?  I’ve got faith in him, too.”

Barnes looked at him.  Really looked at him.  And his gray eyes were as unguarded and open as Tony had ever seen them.  They shone with tears in the pale, harsh light of Tony’s cell phone.  He was softening, sagging, the rage and panic fleeing his tense muscles with a long breath.  Tony nodded, unable to manage a smile for all his trying but glad nonetheless.  “So you keep talking to him, and I’m going to go look around again.”  It took something for him to say that.  To suggest that it was better for Steve and Barnes and even for him that Barnes be the one staying with Steve.  “There’s a way out of here, and I’m going to find it and get help.”

Barnes stared at him, seemingly small and lost and very openly doubting, but Tony refused to look away or visibly share in those fears.  Finally the other man nodded.  He limped back to Steve’s side, collapsing to his rear beside his friend.  Steve was shivering now, minute tremors that were wracking his tall frame against the cold, rocky ground.  He was well into shock from blood loss.  There wasn’t much time.

Tony watched, watched as Barnes stifled a sob and gathered Steve as much as he could in his embrace again, before turning back to the darkness.  He was praying again, but this time he was praying that he would be forgiven for being such a bad liar.

* * *

How long had they been down there?  _Two hours_ , Tony’s brain supplied.  _Maybe._   He checked his phone and his watch and then his phone again.  _One hundred fifteen minutes._

He’d come back from his second search just as empty-handed as he had been after the first.  And his third was no better.  And then Barnes had gone and looked again as well, apparently having recovered enough of his composure to leave Steve in Tony’s hands for a few minutes.  However, he’d returned with a dark expression and the hope gone from his eyes.  They were trapped.  Completely.  Barnes had even chanced pushing around some of the rubble, wary and hesitant in his efforts, but it had been fruitless and he’d immediately stopped when whatever remained intact of the ceiling above them groaned and cracked anew.

And now they were both sitting beside Steve, each as close to him as he could be, waiting in silence.  Silence save for weak rasps that passed for Steve’s breathing.  Barnes had checked his leg a little while ago, loosening the tourniquet now that the bleeding had stopped.  And Tony had examined his abdomen as much as he could through his combat suit only to find it stiff and rigid beneath his gently probing fingers.  Steve was bleeding out inside his body, and there was no way they could stop it.

Steve was dying, and they could only sit there and watch.

That was too hard to accept.  Too hard to even think about.  Tony shivered in the chilly air, pained and fatigued and wishing to god he’d never fired upon that gigantic robot thing. Then he might never have lost his suit and might not have needed Steve to save him.  The robot wouldn’t have pulverized the street around them and beneath them, and they wouldn’t have fallen like they had.  _Should have, could have, would have._   Useless bullshit.  He couldn’t stand his own thoughts anymore.  He was talking before he thought better of it.  “Tell me a story.”

Barnes said nothing.  He was staring emptily at Steve’s unmoving, barely breathing body.  He was observing Steve’s chest, dolor in his eyes.  He was counting breaths and waiting, _willing_ , for each to occur.  The silence was absolutely crippling, and Tony felt ruined.  “Come on, talk to me.  Tell me about the war.  Steve’s always trying to get us to talk.  So talk.”

“You don’t want to talk to me.”

“How do you know?”

“You never have before.”

That was true enough.  Steve had put them (purposefully, because Steve could be scheming and manipulative when it suited him) in numerous positions to “bond” or whatever, and it had ended with awkward silence and tense, terse words between them, the bare minimums of “hello”s and “how are you”s.  But sitting here, watching Steve struggling for breath, waiting for him to die because they were trapped and buried and neither of them was good enough to stop it…  It was too much.  “Maybe I was a jerk before,” Tony answered softly.  “Maybe I didn’t give you a chance, okay?”

Barnes was silent.  “Maybe I didn’t deserve one.”

Tony grunted.  “It’s not easy.  You and him…  It’s not easy to push into that.”

“I know that. I feel the same way.  Don’t you realize that?”

“God, can we stop?  Ever?  Bickering.  Even now.”

“You were right to hate me.  You think I don’t hate myself?  For what I did to you and what I did to him.  No matter what we – what we were back then, he’s _your_ friend now.  He’s your friend, and I almost…  You had a right to hate me.”

That gave Tony pause.  Somehow validation of his feelings (even the ones he’d thought he put to bed) didn’t feel as good as it should have.  The silence came back, laden with unspoken things.  So many unspoken things.  Tony closed his eyes in fatigue and grief, reaching for Steve’s hand and holding it as tight as he could.  _Please, Steve…  Don’t do this to us…_ “Look, Steve’s right.  I try to fix stuff.  That’s what I do.  And when I can’t, it drives me ape-shit nuts.  I just can’t deal with it.  I just can’t sit here in silence and wait for him to die on us.  So tell me something to get my mind off of it.  I don’t care what.  Just something.  _Please._ ”

Barnes choked on his breath a little.  He dipped his head in sorrow, every muscle in his body taut and his breath going ragged.  Then he managed to gasp in a tremoring voice, “He ever tell you about the time he cross-dressed to get past a HYDRA blockade?”

Tony tore his eyes from Steve’s lax face and stared at Barnes for a good long while.  Whatever he’d expected, it hadn’t been something like this.  “Uh…  What?  Really?  No.”

Barnes actually cracked half a smile.  Under the grime and blood ( _tears_ , Tony thought, though he pretended not to notice), he grinned.  “Oh, yeah. Captain America put on a dress.  I saw it with my own eyes.  Dugan and me.”

“I, uh…  Wow.”

“I bet that’s not in the history books or that ridiculous exhibit down in DC,” Barnes said ruefully.  He sniffed and drew his knees up to his chest.  He looked… young.  And shockingly innocent.  “Remembered it all on my own a few weeks ago.”

It might have been Tony’s imagination, but he thought Barnes seemed a little proud of himself for that.  Tony chuckled.  “Yeah, something tells me Capsicle wouldn’t volunteer that one.”

“He doesn’t like it when you call him that.”

“Sure he does,” Tony replied without a doubt.  “Did he say otherwise?”

That made Barnes think for a second.  “No.  But why would he?”

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Steve puts up with a lot of crap just because,” Tony explained, “you and me in a continual pissing contest around him included.”  He hadn’t meant to say it, but now that he did, now that it was out there, he couldn’t help but be ashamed.  The way the two of them had been marking their damn territory like animals the last few weeks.  He sighed, looking down.  His phone was down to 19% battery now.  Another hour.  Maybe an hour and a half.  Then they’d be completely in the dark.  It didn’t really matter.  Steve would be dead by then.  “He doesn’t mind Capsicle.  Or Spangles.  Or…  God, is that really all I have?  I feel like there should be more.”

“Your dad knew about the cross-dressing mission, you know,” Barnes ventured.

“He did?”

“He was the one who put Steve up to it.  It _was_ a good plan.  A way to get Captain America inside the German ranks to take them by surprise.  The Nazis were having some sort of Third Reich version of a USO show, and well, Steve had experience.”  Barnes _did_ grin this time.  Tony barked out a laugh.  “With a USO show, I mean.  Not putting on women’s clothes.”  Barnes’ smile turned sneaky.  “Anyway, the whole thing was over by the time SSR got there.  Steve made Howard promise it wouldn’t be noted in the reports.  I guess it wasn’t.”

“Dad never told me about it,” Tony admitted.  “But that was him.  Far more loyal to the image of a dead man than he was to his own son.”  That came out more bitter than he intended.  Barnes didn’t argue with it, a fact for which Tony was grateful.  He’d never really considered it because Barnes had been so distant and such a source of disquiet and resentment for him, but this man knew his father.  Something else they had in common, it seemed.  The silence returned, deep and unyielding, until Tony cleared his throat.  “Well, you gonna give me the dirty details about this mission or what?  Because you might as well.  He can’t complain.”

Barnes smiled.  “He kinda deserves it.  Always so righteous all the time.  Dumb punk.”

Tony couldn’t argue with that.  “Nobody noticed a six foot dude hiding in a bunch of girls?”

“Apparently not.  I dunno.  Those German girls were buff?”

Tony smiled, trying to picture Steve with the amount of muscle mass he possessed blending in with a line of German dancers.  At least Steve had blond hair and blue eyes.  That had probably helped.  “Please tell me he was part of a kick-line.  And that he wore a wig.”

But Barnes didn’t speak.  He was staring at Steve, and his expression became increasingly concern.  Then worried.  Then _frightened._   “Steve?”  He leaned down suddenly, and Tony couldn’t figure out why for the longest time.  Then he realized Barnes was trying to make sure Steve was breathing.  “Steve!  Come on!”

“Is he breathing?  Is he?”

“No!”

Tony panicked.  _Panicked_.  He jabbed his fingers to Steve’s carotid artery again, hoping, _praying_ he’d find a pulse. There was one.  It was weak, incredibly and miserably weak, but it was _there_.  “Steve, don’t do this,” Tony implored.  He moved without thinking, tipping Steve’s head back and pinching his nose shut and sealing his mouth over Steve’s.  He breathed for him.  Once.  Twice.  He kept at it, kept going, even as he heard Barnes scramble to his feet and search through the wreckage anew.

“Help!  Help us!  We’re down here!”  Barnes was screaming, loud enough to echo in the darkness.  “We need help!  Please!”

“Christ, Steve,” Tony gasped between two breaths.  His head was spinning from adrenaline.  “Don’t do this to us.  Please.  Come on…”  Steve was cold and gray beneath his hands.  This was it.  In a matter of minutes, it was going to be over.  “Please!  Goddamn it, Cap, come on!”

Something crackled.

It was like a roar, despite the loud pounding of their hearts and the gasping of their lungs.  Barnes whirled and looked back at Tony, eyes wide.  It came again.  It was from his ear communicator.  Barnes didn’t need Tony to speak, which was all well and good because Tony couldn’t spare any precious air or time or form words.  “This is Barnes!” Barnes roared, lifting his gloved hand to his mouth and pressing the communicator deeper into his ear.  “Can anyone hear me?  Can anyone copy?”  More static.  “Stark!”

They didn’t need to talk.  They just switched.  Barnes was quick to pull the communicator from his ear and get the receiver portion free from his glove.  He handed those to Tony and then took his place, breathing rhythmically into Steve’s mouth.  “He’s still got a pulse,” Tony announced as he grabbed his phone and shed some light on the situation.  The microphone portion of the communicator was damaged; he could see it instantly.  “Give me his glove!”

Barnes realized what he needed without any more instruction.  He pried Steve’s glove loose from his hand and tossed it to Tony.  Tony’s fumbling fingers searched for Steve’s mic, and he pulled it free carefully so as to not damage it.  Despite his spinning head and trembling hands, it took only a second for Tony to attach the ear piece with the working mic.  Then he held it to his mouth, not daring to hope.  “Hello?  Natasha?  Clint?  _Somebody!_   It’s Tony, and we need help!”

“… –ark, coming…  Copy?”

Tony could have melted then and there from relief.  “Say again.  Say again!  Please!”

It was Clint’s voice.  “Stark…  Cap and Bucky…  –are you?”

“We’re trapped,” Tony replied.  “Underground!  In a subway tunnel!  We went down, uh, by Lexington and 72nd!  You need to hurry!  Steve’s hurt, and he’s dying!  We can’t move him!”

“–ulk’s inbound.  A lot of debris.  Can you … a signal?  Tony?  We can’t find you!  Tony?”

There was a distant roar.  A familiar roar.  Tony crawled over to Barnes and Steve.  The former was nearly frantic, and the latter was still slipping away.  “Come on, Stevie.  Breathe.  Come on!”

“Come on, Steve!  They’re coming now!  Don’t you dare quit on us!”  Tony thrust his phone at Barnes.  “You gotta go.  Take this.  Go out there and make noise and see if you can shine the light through the wreckage.  Bruce is coming, but he doesn’t know where we are, so you gotta–”

“But–”

“You’re stronger and faster than I am!  Go!  I’ve got him!”

Barnes looked at him, _trusted_ him.  He didn’t need any further prodding.  He took the cell phone and stood, running through the dark maze of rubble around them toward the small gap and the wreckage beyond it.  There was no way to know from which direction Bruce would come, but he had to guess since there was no time.  Tony scrambled closer and took Steve’s pulse again.  Thank God his heart was still beating.  Thank God.  But when Tony dropped his cheek close to Steve’s pale lips, there was still no breath.  “Damn it, Steve,” Tony groaned.  He pushed the communicator into his ear and resumed breathing for Steve.  _Steady.  Easy.  Come on, come on, come on!_

Another roar shook the tunnel.  “Over here!” Barnes shouted loudly.  “Over here!  We’re here!”  Tony could hear him moving the wreckage in earnest now, pushing what could be pushed to get the light to shine through the wall of rubble.  The debris around them shuddered, and the barely intact ceiling gave a gut-wrenching lurch.  Tony cried out in fear as rocks tumbled down around them.  _God, please…_   He slanted his mouth over Steve’s again and heaved another breath.  _Please!_

The ceiling cracked.  He scrambled, reaching for Steve’s shield that had lain idle beside them all this time.  He barely got it, sliding it onto his bare arm and whipping it over them both as debris cascaded from above.  It clattered against the shield over Steve’s head.  _Hurry!  Hurry!_   _Stay together!_   The whole tunnel shook, and more came down in a deadly avalanche.  The Hulk didn’t know how structurally compromised this place was, and if it came apart…  _No!  Not after all of this!_

Tony cried out as a chunk of something slammed into his back.  In the pitch, he couldn’t see anything.  He could feel Steve underneath him, cold and unmoving.  He could feel his own heart, booming in his chest.  The world collapsed, and Tony screamed.

But they weren’t crushed.  Barnes was there, on top of them both and taking the blows with his own body, the metal arm protectively over them and the light from the cell phone shining down.  Tony squeezed his eyes shut, hot tears bleeding from corners in pain and fear and _relief_ , and when it was over, he released a shuddering breath and nearly fell onto Steve as his strength gave out.

Light blasted over them, light from the sun overhead as the Hulk dug and pushed the rubble away and lifted it aside.  Tony blinked, struggling against the sudden, blinding illumination.  He saw Clint, Natasha, Sam, and Thor coming down the tunnel the Hulk had cleared, as well as a slew of EMTs with medical supplies and backboards and a stretcher.  _Thank God.  Thank God._

Barnes let him up slowly.  He, too, seemed stunned beyond measure, as though he didn’t trust his senses to be truthful considering how close they’d come to dying.  In the light he was battered and bruised and worn, but his eyes were warm now, and he managed a smile.

Below them, safe in their arms, Steve was breathing again.

* * *

Steve had managed to do a real number on himself this time.  Six hours of surgery had been necessary to deal with his lacerated liver and crushed spleen.  His leg had been in bad shape, but the doctors were able to repair it.  The blow to the back of his head was more concerning, but a CT scan showed the swelling was already abating by the next morning and his neck wasn’t permanently damaged.  Anybody else would have been dead a thousand times over.  Steve would be fine, in time and with care.  Three days later, he was firmly on the path to recovery, comfortably sleeping in the ICU while the serum did its work.

Tony knocked on the open door to Steve’s room.  Barnes was already there, clean shaven and simply dressed in jeans and a polo shirt that almost looked strange on him.  Almost.  “Hey,” Tony said.  Barnes nodded at him.  He was back to himself again, cool and composed and stoic.  The signs of the emotional rollercoaster the both of them had endured in that collapsing tunnel were long gone, like they’d never been there at all.  But they had been.  Tony had seen them.  “Mind if I come in?”

“No,” Barnes said.  Tony limped inside the room, closing the door behind him.  One of the pieces of debris that had struck him at the end of the nightmare had hit a nerve in his back.  It had resulted with him on crutches until the bruising around his spine healed.  The weird thing was, with Steve’s prognosis, it seemed like Captain America could be done limping around before he was.  It didn’t look that way now.  Steve was out like a light, being pumped full of morphine strong enough to overcome his serum-enhanced metabolism.  The doctors were optimistic he’d regain consciousness soon with the head injury on the mend.  There were bandages around his belly, thick and protective, and his leg was in a splint and a soft cast and wrapped thoroughly.  A blanket covered him up to his hips, and his wounded thigh was propped on a pillow.  He looked good.  He had healthy color, and he was peaceful.  He was okay.

They were all okay.  Shockingly.

“Another fun-filled Avengers adventure,” Tony joked gruffly as he limped and grunted his way over to the other chair beside the bed.  He lowered himself into it with a creak and groan.  He was getting too old for this crap.  “You sure you don’t regret joining our merry band of ne’er-do-wells?”

Barnes’ lips curled into a hint of a smile.  “No, I don’t regret it.”

“Good.”  And uncomfortable moment of silence came between them.  Tony cleared his throat.  “I just… Uh, well…” He shifted uncomfortably.  This was never easy for him.  “I just wanted to say I was wrong.  About a lot of things.  But mostly about you not being Steve’s friend.  Maybe… you were his friend first.  You do know him better than I do.”

Barnes didn’t say anything to that.  The ice was coming back, the ice and the distance that Tony found so off-putting.  But it was easier to see past it now.  And it was easier for Barnes to get past it, too.  “Doesn’t work that way, Stark,” Barnes finally said.  “But thanks.”  Tony grunted a little sound of surprise.  Was that Barnes’ way of telling him that he was just as much Steve’s friend as Barnes himself was?  “I’m sorry.  I lost it back there.”

“Yeah, well, I did, too.”

Barnes’ gaze was empty, not judging but maybe wondering if it really was okay.  It was.  “Sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it.  You don’t need to apologize.  You don’t owe me anything.”  Not really.  Not an explanation.  Not an apology.  _No nothing._   Tony smiled faintly.  “Except a story about Captain America wearing a dress.”

A weak groan came from the bed.  “Not that…”

Barnes moved forward and grabbed Steve’s hand.  “Steve?”

Tony scooted closer, too, his heart alight with the fact that Steve was waking up.  “Cap?  You with us?”

Hazy blue eyes blinked open wearily.  They focused with some effort, first on Barnes and after that on Tony.  Then they slid shut again.  The pink of Steve’s tongue wet his lips, and Barnes reached over for a cup of water on a bedside table.  “Shoulda… shoulda known that that would be it.”

“That what would be what?” Tony asked.  “That the two of us would be the ones to save your sorry butt from another life or death situation?  Bucky’s done it so much now that he deserves a freaking medal.”

 _Bucky._   He had never said that before.  It was always “Barnes”.  Tony felt a little cold wave of shock tickle through him, and he actually wondered if he’d overstepped his bounds.  Because he wasn’t Barnes’ friend, even if this was the most they’d ever talked.  He wasn’t, even if they’d both do anything, give anything, for Steve’s sake.  He wasn’t, even if he wanted to be.  He wasn’t Barnes’ friend.

Was he?

But Barnes – _Bucky_ – smiled fondly.  And not just at Steve.  “What’re you talking about, Steve?  Here’s some water.”

Tony stood to help Steve sit up a little.  Steve drank from the straw Bucky guided between his lips.  Then he sagged wearily back into the hospital bed and groaned.  “Thanks.  Owe you for a lot.  Thanks for savin’ me back there.”  Steve wasn’t just saying that to one of them.  It was to _both_ of them, because they’d saved him _together_.  Tony’s heart swelled with pride, and he shared a knowing look with Bucky.  A _knowing_ look, as crazy as that was.  “But I should…  I should’ve known that you would finally bond over… over my embarrassment.”

Tony laughed.  “Well, now I have to hear this.  So I can post it all over the internet.  You know how many Twitter followers I have?”

Bucky looked at Steve like he was searching for Steve’s permission.  Steve grunted and let his eyes slip shut again.  “Go ahead,” he mumbled in half-hearted disdain and whole-hearted resignation.  “It’s not like every other part of me isn’t bruised.  Do a number on my ego, too.  Besides…”  He closed his eyes and grinned faintly.  “Better than listenin’ to you two jackasses arguin’.”

Tony wondered if Steve hadn’t somehow heard everything that had gone on down in that hole.  Maybe he had.  Maybe.  And maybe he could be right about the two of them.  There was common ground between them.  Their unwavering faith in Steve.  And somehow they’d found some faith in each other.

So Bucky told Tony about the time Captain America wore a dress for the good of Allied war effort.  Tony laughed through it, because it was pretty hilarious.  Much to Steve’s chagrin, this particular story Bucky remembered with stunning and humiliating detail.  And much to Tony’s surprise, he found that sitting there with Bucky and Steve and talking and laughing and doing what friends did…  It was fine, after all.  This was where he wanted to be.

**THE END**


End file.
